Friday, March 29, 2013

Here's another from the same period when I had just left college and I was using a strong black ink line to define my forms. It was a technique inspired by the wonderful art of Arthur Rackham and others working during the Golden Age of illustration at the start of the twentieth century.

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Here's another early piece from my portfolio that I have always been very fond of. This one is called "The Light Machine".As in the previous post the technique involved painting in watercolour over a pretty detailed ink line drawing.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

I like posting some of my illustrations from years ago.
This was one I well remember doing as a portfolio piece in those difficult months just after I leaving college.
In terms of subject matter I can only say that it was heavily influenced by Mervyn Peake's Gormenghast books.
Back in those days I was still trying to develop my own technique and I was using a very dominant black ink line over which I would apply watercolours.
I'm still very fond of this illustration.

Friday, March 15, 2013

A day of life painting at the RHA is a pretty rare event for me these days, but yesterday I was able to get in and to see some great old pals and to work with two excellent models, Des and Darren.
Here is the picture I did of Des in the afternoon and a shot of the man himself at my easel which will give you a sense of the small scale of the painting.

Monday, March 11, 2013

You might remember I posted one of my first drawings for the book I am working on now.
It's very early days and I don't want to say too much about the subject of the book but I will post bits and pieces as I progress through the project.
Here it is again, and below is the finished painting.

Friday, March 8, 2013

Last weekend I had another visit to my archive which is rather a messy place to go, but I do love to hunt around and dig out some pieces I haven't seen for years.
Here's a picture I did for a project when I was at Art College in Brighton.
It illustrates a scene from A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula LeGuin.
At that time I was using an ink line to delineate shapes and forms and I think I was also using coloured inks along with my watercolour as I tried to find a technique that suited me.
This was a pretty important picture in my college career.

Wednesday, March 6, 2013

CBI have announced that Pictiúr, an exciting new exhibition of the work of some of Ireland’s leading children’s book illustrators and which has been curated by Laureate na nÓg, Niamh Sharkey, will visit four venues in Europe during Ireland’s Presidency of the EU, before returning to Ireland to tour.I'm delighted to be one of the illustrators involved.This picture from The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey is one of my originals in the show.